27/01/2023
Updated at 7:33 pm
If the state loses the monopoly on violence, violence does not disappear, but falls into other hands willing to use it for their own fines. A good example is Haiti, where six police officers were murdered on Thursday by gang members in the town of Liancourt, in the center of the country, in the latest episode of a problem that has not stopped growing for five years and has claimed fourteen lives since January. As a result of the fatigue of the population -harassed by poverty, natural catastrophes, political instability and the chronic fragility of the State-, police dressed as civilians and ordinary citizens took to the streets this Friday to protest, staging violent clashes and erecting barricades in the capital and other towns.
According to the story made on a local radio station by the policeman Jean Bruce Myrtil, his companions were murdered with brutal violence. The attack occurred in a sub-station, giving the agents had to resist the harassment of the gang members up to three times, finally being overcome by the members of the gangs. Two police officers appeared hanging in the last assault, and the other four, who were previously injured and received medical attention at a clinic, were taken out onto the street and finished off without hesitation.
social unrest
After the event, public anger was directed on Friday against the country's prime minister, Ariel Henry, and more specifically against his official residence, which was assaulted; later, against the Toussaint Louverture airport, in a series of riots aimed at the president, who returned by plane from a trip to Argentina, and which also caused air traffic interruptions. According to sources consulted by Reuters, Henry was trapped in the facilities due to the tidal wave of discontent that surrounded him.
As he explained to a Global Initiative informant, the gang phenomenon has not stopped reproducing in Haiti over the last five years, as the weakness of the State and successive crises have allowed it to flourish. The gangs want to “expand their control over the public administration, the strategic economic territories and the population”, proposals that they satisfy with violence. For a citizenry with low expectations, these groups will often follow escape routes; some even have candidate waiting lists.
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